Baroness Blake of Leeds: .... However, trade-offs will be required, and this needs to be managed at the highest level of government. The coming decade is crucial to tackling the climate and ecological crises. The latest findings from the independent panel on climate change were the starkest warning yet that the crisis is here right now and is the biggest long-term threat that we face. The extreme weather events of...
Baroness Blake of Leeds: .... However, trade-offs will be required, and this needs to be managed at the highest level of government. The coming decade is crucial to tackling the climate and ecological crises. The latest findings from the independent panel on climate change were the starkest warning yet that the crisis is here right now and is the biggest long-term threat that we face. The extreme weather events of...
Liam McArthur: ...on all the ideas, but the debate has served a useful purpose. I welcome the cabinet secretary’s confirmation that she will support my amendment and the amendment in the name of Rhoda Grant. I find her reason for not supporting Liam Kerr’s amendment rather strange. As I said in my opening remarks, it is absolutely right that the Government is taking a local, islands-based approach,...
Michael Matheson: .... We have seen great successes in our renewables sector. ScotWind, for example, represents the world’s largest commercial round for floating offshore wind. Yesterday, we published our final onshore wind policy statement, setting out our ambition to deploy 20GW of onshore wind by 2030. Those successes must be replicated in other sectors as we harness the opportunities that the transition...
Matthew Pennycook: ...majority of more than 80, the Government are developing an alarming habit of allowing national policy to be dictated by the demands of amorphous groups of their own Back Benchers. In the case of onshore wind deployment, the Government’s weakness in the face of such demands is all ostensibly to the good, because Ministers are now seemingly committed to amending the NPPF to finally end the...
Baroness Chapman of Darlington: ...available. Its effectiveness is therefore compromised too. Everyone will agree that, for most children, being placed close to home or with a suitable family member is the right approach. Yet we find that in recent years the number of children being placed miles from home, or in unregulated accommodation, is going up and up. As I am sure the Minister will agree, that needs to stop. With...
Alistair Carmichael: ...hon. Member wants to send me his CV, I will keep it on file for when I next have a vacancy for a speech writer. I am at risk of being too consensual, but he knows my views on this and we have to find a way to recognise that in energy security there is no silver bullet. Contributions will be made by all sectors on the journey towards net zero. The Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult...
Lord Callanan: ...of homes across the country. As I said, I would be interested to see any consultation responses for that. Having all this support in place is all very well, but people need to know where to find it. That is why we are providing about £18 million to expand our public awareness campaign to help households to do what they can to reduce their usage and bills, protecting vulnerable people...
Lord Tunnicliffe: ...and would they deliver the growth that our economy so badly needs? All the analysis we have seen since 17 November suggests that the Government have failed on both counts. As more and more people find themselves paying tax, some others were spared an increase to their bills: banks will see their surcharge fall from 8% to 3%; energy producers that exploit fossil fuels will continue to...
Ed Miliband: ...it? Alongside nuclear, we need a sprint for cheap, clean, home-grown renewables, and I have to say to the Secretary of State that, given the chaos, confusion and embarrassment of the Government on onshore wind, I find it extraordinary that he did not clear that up in the House today. Let me remind the House of some facts. The ban on onshore wind in England that they put in place in 2015...
Liam McArthur: ...renewables energy industry; understands that the report demonstrates that Scotland’s renewable energy industry and its supply chain supported more than 27,000 full time equivalent jobs, and that onshore wind supported the most employment across Scotland’s economy from the renewable energy sector, with 10,120 full time equivalent roles, followed by offshore wind with 6,735 full-time...
Virendra Sharma: ...most of the past 12 years, yet the Government blame others for the mess that we are in. They blame economic headwinds, but never turn the blame on the Members who caused the trouble in which we find ourselves. It has been a political choice to govern like that—to run the economy into the ground; to slash living standards through economic mismanagement; to under-invest in the NHS; and to...
Abena Oppong-Asare: ...in his strategic steer to the bank in March that it should support the Government’s ambition of addressing “the deep spatial disparities across and within UK regions”. Those are his words. I find it strange that when he outlined the bank’s objectives in the strategic steer, his description of the climate objective matched that in the Bill, but his description of the economic...
Rachel Reeves: I thank the Chancellor for his statement. Here we are, the end of 2022. Three Prime Ministers, four Chancellors and four Budgets later, where do we find ourselves? In a worse place than we started the year, with inflation spiralling, growth plunging and living standards falling. Britain is a great country with fantastic strengths but, because of this Government’s mistakes, we are being held...
Peter Grant: ...denounced as cheap foreign labour by their own Member of Parliament, and if they no longer feel welcome in Peterborough, they can come to Fife or to Scotland. They will be made welcome. They will find thousands of businesses desperate to give them work: not “cheap foreign labour” work, but well-paid work that will keep the Scottish economy going. The motion is about the Government’s...
Kerry McCarthy: ...the return of fracking in areas where there was local support. The Prime Minister also came out against solar power. I do not suppose the Minister is in a position to reply, but I am trying to find out through parliamentary questions whether there has been a change to the mooted policy of the previous Administration—we almost need names for each of the Administrations, because it gets...
Fergus Ewing: ...are all here not to play politics with the past but to propel progress in the future. To that end, I would just reflect that, when I was energy minister, one of my most frustrating experiences was finding out that it could take 12 years to get consents for an onshore wind farm that it took 12 months to construct. I therefore suggest to the minister that the Scottish Government review the...
Wera Hobhouse: ...incentivised firms to invest in fossil fuel extraction. And our Prime Minister had to be dragged to the COP 27 summit this week. He was asked only today whether he would lift the de facto veto on onshore wind, but he did not answer the question. That gives rise to the question: what is this Government about? We have just heard that we need to find solutions that are affordable. The most...
Liz Saville-Roberts: ..., as it puts under the microscope something that is affecting a number of fishing vessels. He is a fisherman from Nefyn, a town near where I live, which has a long and proud tradition of both onshore and offshore fishing; it even supplied captains for whaling vessels back in the day. Mr Roberts has been trying to recruit fishing crew members from outside the European economic area. In the...
Trudy Harrison: ...England Published. This defined the range of environmental risks and the current regulatory controls and was the starting point for development of sector specific guidance. The current version of Onshore Oil and Gas Sector Guidance was published in 2019. It sets out what activities require environmental permits and how an applicant is required to demonstrate that the impact on the...